motherland, cradle me
by madetine
Summary: A year after the Promised Day, General Mustang and Captain Hawkeye face new challenges that threaten to tear them apart for good. Rated M for language and eventual smut. CHAPTER 2 UP!
1. Chapter 1

**AN: So hi everyone! My name is Madetine. I was always a fan of the original Fullmetal Alchemist anime, way back when it first came out in America and I was president of my high school anime club, and over the years I've thought a lot about Royai. I saw that Brotherhood was on Netflix recently and I binge watched it and holy shit, I loved it. I've read a lot of wonderful fics recently from some really talented authors and I wanted to humbly offer this story. It's been over 10 years since I've written any fanfic (if you want to read anything else that I've written, it's all under my old profile, Lady Celestia17. There's no FMA and nothing was particularly great though) so I hope that this turns out okay. I have a pretty complex idea for this story and I hope that I can pull it off. It is going to be multi-chaptered. This takes place about a year after the end of the series. This is un-beta'd and I'm sorry if the formatting sucks. I really hope that you all like it!**

 **EDIT: I've made some alterations to this chapter to flesh it out a bit more. Hopefully it's better!**

* * *

The morning started like every other. Roy's alarm went off at 6:30 like it always did. He showered, shaved and dressed like he always did. He ate the same breakfast that he had every morning; orange juice and toast. And at 7:30 he left his house, locked the door and walked to his car.

It was a Monday in July. The sun was bright already and he knew that he would have to adjust the blinds in the office so that it wasn't too sunny. He sat with his back to the windows and by midday he could feel beads of sweat on his neck, and see Riza squinting at the paperwork in front of her. Maybe he could have a fan put in to help cool the room. It was a lot bigger than his old office, but maybe it felt that way because it was so empty. While Fuery, Falman, Havoc, and Breda all still worked in the East City Headquarters, they were no longer in positions under his direct employ, so it was just him and Riza. It was quieter too and he missed the constant bantering and bickering that often carried on in his old office. Not that Riza wasn't good company... in fact, he enjoyed her company too much. That was part of the problem.

Maybe he'd ask her if she wanted a fan tucked into the corner. Or maybe not. He liked to tease her when he noticed her fidgeting with the many layers of her uniform and see the blush rise in her cheeks before she tartly rebutted him. That was part of the problem too.

That's what he was thinking about, the blinds and the office and the air conditioning, when he turned the key into the lock of his car door. And that's when the bomb went off.

* * *

"General? General, can you hear me?"

The ringing in his ears was too intense and he tried to put his hands to his ears to stop the noise, but found that he couldn't. There was something attached to his arm. With a groan and his eyes still shut, he groped blindly to the sting of pain near his elbow to remove the offending thing, and immediately a stinging pain flashed through his arm.

"No, General, stop."

He knew that voice. It soothed his motions for a moment and he shook his head, trying to dissipate the fog that was aching inside. He tried to sit up and regretted it immediately because the pain increased tenfold. He gripped his forehead, groaning.

"Lay down."

The voice was more commanding this time and he felt a gentle pressure on his left arm and chest, easing him back into a prone position. He didn't want to; the bed that he was laying in was hard and rigid.

He tried opening his eyes and through the bleariness he could make out a fair face with large brown eyes staring straight into his.

"Captain," he made out, his own voice grating in his throat. "What happened?"

Rubbing at his face and eyes with his free hand, his vision finally cleared and he noticed the strong sterile smell that indicated that he was in a hospital. He hated hospitals. It reminded him of being surrounded in lonely darkness for long days, and sleepless nights staring into nothing.

Riza leaned forward and he could see the worry in her eyes. "There was a bomb in your car, sir. It went off when you opened the door." She paused before continuing in a soft voice, heavy with concern. "Can you see?"

It was as if she had read his mind. "Yes," he murmured in affirmation, "but my head is killing me."

He could feel her relax a little bit by his side and he realized that his arm was hooked up to an IV filled with clear liquid. "What are the damages?" He still had all of his limbs, he could tell as he flexed the muscles of his hands and bare feet, but he was bound tightly by bandages around his arms and legs.

"Very minimal, sir. The surgeons had to pick a lot of glass out of you but you escaped all of the metal shrapnel." There was another pause, and he looked over at her again. Her eyes were downcast, staring at where her hand was placed on his bandaged forearm. "You were very lucky."

Roy kept his eyes on her but didn't say anything for a minute, just laid his hand over his on his chest. Her eyes raised to meet his and held his gaze, and he felt the familiar tug in his chest that he had experienced so many times over so many years.

They both jumped when a doctor entered the room, clutching a chart. Riza withdrew from him immediately and he felt an ache at the loss of her closeness. He choked it down, like he always did.

"How are you feeling General Mustang?" The doctor asked in a jovial tone, looking over the documents in his hands. If he had seen an intimate moment between a captain of the Amestrian State Military and her direct superior.

"Like I've been hit by a truck," Roy groaned, trying to sit up again. This time Riza didn't stop him and he realized that his chest was bandaged too.

The doctor chuckled and closed the chart. "Well in a way you were. Your wounds were superficial, though, and you should be healed soon."

Roy sat up fully, hands gripping the stark sheets. "So am I free to go?"

The doctor nodded. "As soon as you feel comfortable."

Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, Roy stood up slowly. Riza immediately leap to her feet and put his arm on her shoulder, letting him lean on her.

"I'll get a nurse to take out your saline IV," the doctor told them, before leaving.

"Are you sure you feeling up to it, sir?" The captain asked, gripping his shoulder.

Her concern ate at him. He didn't want her to worry about him. "I'm fine," he answered softly. "I can stand on my own, I think."

The nurse came in and unhooked his IV, slipping the needle out of his arm. He shuddered at the sensation and Riza was at his side again. Once the nurse left, he turned to her. He realized that he was only wearing rough cotton pants. "Can you bring me my clothes?"

She nodded curtly and he watched her walk around the room to gather a bundle. "I brought you a new set from your house. What you were wearing was pretty torn up."

He knew that she had a key to his house so it didn't surprise him. "Thank you."

She turned her back to him as he dressed. She had brought him civilian clothes and he looked out the windows, realizing that the sun was low in the sky. It felt like just a few minutes ago that it was time to go to work. "How long have I been here?"

"About 9 hours, sir. We got the call at headquarters after the ambulance took you here."

He put his hand on her shoulder to let her know that he was finished dressing and, honestly, to steady himself. She looked back up at him. "Are you ready to go home?"

He nodded and she took his arm, sensing that he needed her help to stand. "Thank you."

"You're welcome, sir." She opened the door to exit the room and suddenly her voice had taken a different, more professional tone. Walking slowly, they exited the hospital. His eyes were keen enough now to realize that everyone seemed to be looking at them, and like always he worried that it was the closeness of his subordinate that made people stare at them. He knew that Riza realized it too, and her back straightened. "Headquarters is going to supply a car for you until you get a new one."

Roy groaned with realization. "I liked that car."

"The car is replaceable, sir," she answered in a clipped tone.

He knew what she was saying. The car was replaceable. He was not.

They didn't say anything else as she helped him into the passenger seat and slid into the driver's side, or along the ride that took them back to his home. His driveway had been cleaned up already and she was able to drive up to his house and park neatly, although he heard the crunch of glass under the tires and their feet once they left the car. She got out first and helped him out of his seat and up to the front door.

When they reached the door they turned to each other. She was the first to speak.

"Do you need anything else, sir?"

They were so close, he realized. It would be so easy to-

His hand clenched around his keys as he remembered the stares of the people in the hospital.

"No, thank you, Captain."

She nodded. Her eyes would have been hard to read to anyone else. "You should rest, sir. I can bring your work to you tomorrow."

"Don't bother, Captain. I'll be in tomorrow morning." He turned away from her to unlock the front door and open it.

"Okay." She watched him with critical eyes and he knew that she was assessing his condition. "Goodnight then, General."

Roy didn't look back at her. He knew that if he would, he might do something that they both would regret. "Good night, Captain."

And he closed the door. He didn't see her return to the borrowed car and unholster her gun to set it in her lap. The sun set on her alone in the car, watching the house.

* * *

 **AN: Please tell me what you think! I appreciate any feedback, even critical. I know that I'm not very good at being descriptive and it's something that I'm trying to work on. Thank you so much for reading! I hope to post every Sunday.**


	2. Chapter 2

_AN: So I know that I said that I would post on Sunday but I couldn't wait to get this chapter up. Thank you so much for the favorites and follows, and especially the very thoughtful review by pen n' notebook. I hope that you all like this chapter too!_

* * *

In the morning, while locking the door to his house, Roy realized that he didn't have the keys to the car that headquarters had lent him. Riza only lived a few blocks away, he mused, so maybe he could just walk to her apartment and pick them up from her and they could drive to work together. It was a good plan because he knew that she took the bus to and from work and he could save her a couple hundred cenz.

As he approached the car, though, he noticed a detail that proved that his plan wouldn't work at all. Riza was already sitting in the driver's seat, looking up at him. She rolled down the window. "Are you ready to go to work, General?"

His eyes searched her face in confusion. "Have you been out here all night?" He asked incredulously.

"No." A guilty look crossed her face. She looked tired. The dark circles under her eyes were even more prominent on her fair skin. "This morning I left for about an hour to wash up and change clothes. I checked the car and the perimeter of your house when I got back, though. Everything is all clear."

Roy shook his head in disbelief. "You shouldn't have done that. I was fine."

"No, I needed to do that. Someone tried to kill you, General, and it is my job to protect you." There was a tone of finality in her voice that indicated that the conversation was over. "We have to leave now if we don't want to be late."

Although he still didn't feel right about the situation, he got into the passenger side of the car, fighting a wince as he slid into the seat. While he was feeling much better today, every movement seemed to pull at the hundreds of incisions where glass was pulled from his body yesterday. When he closed the car door he realized that she was watching him with scrutinizing features.

"Are you sure that you're ready to get back to work, Sir?"

"I'm fine, Captain. Just a little sore, that's all." He knew that he couldn't stop her from worrying about him but maybe he could ease her mind a little. She seemed to take his reassurance and started the car.

After a couple of minutes of driving she broke the silence. "Can I ask you a question, General?"

"Yes," came his immediate reply, shifting his gaze from the familiar buildings that moved past their car to her weary face. Worry deepened in his chest.

She looked back at the road, and he was relieved to find that her tone was light. "When Lieutenant Havoc drove for you, you always sat in the back. But when I drive for you, you always sit up front with me."

The question caught him off guard because he had never really thought about it before. Why did he he always sit in the passenger seat while she was behind the wheel? It had just been an instinct. He supposed it was because on some level, it was because he wanted them to be equals. Their trust in each other was implicit, after all. She would always watch his back, and he would always protect her.

But he couldn't tell her that. No matter how close they were, she was still his subordinate. "Well you see Captain," he began smoothly, a wolfish grin spreading across his lips, "I just like sitting close to beautiful women."

Riza scoffed at that, although it looked to him like she was fighting back a smile. He savored it. "I'm being serious. You know that it doesn't look proper."

 _Proper._ He hated that word when she used it. _Proper_ meant that he couldn't do things that he wanted to do with her. It meant that every word spoken between them and every action they performed had to be as though they were being strictly monitored. And he knew that people watched them in the headquarters's offices, and he knew the rumors that swirled whenever they were together, although it never was addressed to him directly due to his status. Even though over the years he had gone on numerous dates with numerous women, he and Riza always seemed to gather attention- which was all the time now that they were alone the whole work day.

Ever since their promotions he could swear that Riza had been colder to him. Maybe it was because they didn't have the buffer of his men between them, or that his being a general put him in the spotlight. But she was definitely more distant. Gone were the soft touches to his hands when she gave him paperwork, and she didn't play along with his teasing remarks. She barely seemed to look at him at all, even. Yesterday, in the hospital, when she had let him hold her hand while he was laying in bed, was the closest that they had been in months. He knew that her feelings for him hadn't changed because he could still hear her heart in her voice every time that she spoke to him- a faint spark of want and longing that would be imperceptible to anyone but him. His ears had been trained to hear all the things that she couldn't, wouldn't say to him after all of their years together. Riza couldn't hide that from him, at least.

"General?" Her voice shook him and he realized that she had parked and was looking at him expectantly.

He muttered an apology and stepped out of the car, cognizant that as he walked inside that she was following him, always one step behind.

* * *

"Where are you going?" Roy asked as she stood up from her desk and gathered the bag that she always carried with her. A quick glace at his pocket watch told him that it was only 1400 hours. There was still 3 hours left in the work day.

A frown crossed her face as she looked up at him, already slipping the bag on her shoulder. "I have a doctor's appointment. You approved my leave over a month ago."

Oh. He had, of course, forgotten. "It's fine, Captain. See you tomorrow." He hoped that her health wasn't in jeopardy in any way.

She had been waiting for his permission and now that she had it she started towards the door. "See you tomorrow, General. Don't get behind on your paperwork."

After the door had clicked shut behind her he leaned his elbows on his desk and buried his face in his hands.

* * *

On the other side of town, Riza arrived at the clinic a few minutes before her appointment. When she had called the office to make her appointment the receptionist had informed her that the doctor that she had been seeing when she lived in East City a few years ago had retired, but that she could make an appointment to see a new doctor at the practice, Dr. Stala. After checking in with the receptionist and completing some paperwork, she walked over to the seating area.

"Captain!" The receptionist called her back over to the desk with a sheepish expression. When Riza stepped back over the young woman explained with a sheepish expression, "We don't allow weapons in the exam room."

"Oh." Riza hand slipped down to feel the gun strapped to her side. She unstrapped it and slid it across the counter, then reached down to unhook the smaller pistol that she had strapped to her ankle.

"We'll put them in a locker behind the desk," the girl reassured her, taking the weapons with great care. Riza watched as her beloved guns were tucked away before she took a seat.

Unbeknownst to the General she had set up a security detail to monitor his home around the clock until they caught the person or persons who had planted the car bomb that had threatened his life. It would just be two plainclothes MPs watching his house from a car parked down the street. She had already put together a team to try to solve the mystery quickly. The thought chilled her, that there was someone out in East City right now who was plotting to kill her General. And she would not let that happen.

Riza looked down at her hands in her lap. She thought about the phone call that she had received at 0800 yesterday morning saying that he had been the victim of an attack and the sheer panic that had taken over her until she could be by his side. Surgery had taken so long and after a few hours of pestering the doctors and nurses that filtered in and out of the surgery room they started avoiding her and she was ordered to sit in the waiting room. She had left for short period to gather some of his personal belongings from his home, but she rushed back to the hospital as quickly as she could. Finally, after half a day of waiting, she was finally allowed to see him, and viewing him laying comatose in the hospital bed was enough to shake her normally steel nerves. She waited until everyone left the room before pulling a chair up close to his side.

He was so pale and the sight of him all bandaged up raised tears in her eyes. After a minute of watching him, she scooted forward in the chair and laid her head on his chest. Her golden hair pooled on the white bandages as she listened to his slow breathing and the soft beating of his heart.

Ever since they had returned from Ishval and had received their promotions, her nerves felt stretched as tight as a string. Every interaction with the General made her feel guilty, like they were doing something wrong. All of their secret glances, brushing of hands, and enigmatic words that they had carried on for so long had to stop, she decided. When he was a Colonel they had pushed their relationship far enough that they could get away with tiny displays of affection and not get caught. But with his promotion everything had changed. He was now the most important man in East City and they were so close to achieving his goal of becoming Fuhrer. And she would not do anything to cause them to stray from that path. Even if it meant denying herself of the moments that she cherished most.

Then he stirred and all of her musings of propriety vanished. She had quickly wiped the tears from her eyes and waited for him to wake up.

She was the only one in the waiting room of the clinic. A window was open and her hair stirred as a slight breeze wafted through the room. She was so tired. The radio was playing, and a song came on, one that she hadn't heard in years, and she closed her eyes, her scalp tingling with the memory...

 _"Where in hell can you go_  
 _Far from the things that you know_  
 _Far from the sprawl of concrete_  
 _That keeps crawling its way_  
 _About one thousand miles a day?_  
 _Take one last look behind_  
 _Commit this to memory and mind_  
 _Don't miss this wasteland, this_  
 _Terrible place when you leave_  
 _Keep your heart off your sleeve..."_

"...Miss? Captain Hawkeye?"

Riza looked up, startled. There was a nurse standing in front of her. "We're ready for you to come back now," she explained.

"Oh." Riza stood up quickly and followed the nurse back to an exam room. She was instructed to sit on an exam table and the nurse asked her questions- if she smoked (no), if she drank (a glass of wine every night), how many sexual partners had she had in the last year…

"None," Riza answered sheepishly. Not in the last year anyway. She thought about before Ishval and the Promised Day that there had been someone that she had dated briefly. His name has been James, she met him at a book store, and he was sweet but she broke it off after a couple months. She couldn't give him a good reason why.

The nurse nodded and wrote everything down, before giving her a gown and telling Riza that the doctor would be in shortly.

She undressed and slipped on the gown so that it was open in the front and sat back on the exam table, eyeing the stirrups at the end. She wrapped the gown around her tightly and waited for the doctor.

Luckily, she didn't have to wait long. She watched the door open and close behind a tall man with short brown hair. He was wearing a lab coat but his eyes were obscured behind large classes.

"Captain Hawkeye," he greeted, extending a hand to her to shake. His voice was quiet and deep. "I'm Dr. Stala. It's nice to meet you." He smiled but she couldn't see his eyes.

"It's nice to meet you too, Doctor" she offered, shaking his hand quickly. "You can call me Riza." It felt weird for her gynecologist to call her by her rank, especially when she was sitting naked on an exam table.

"Okay, Riza." He put the clip board down and moved to stand by her side. "I'm just going to give you an examination and then take a pap smear. Does that sound okay?"

Riza nodded and laid back on the table, unwrapping the paper gown so that she was completely bare. She stared at the ceiling as his hands traced her breasts and tried not to wince as his cold hands molded her bare flesh. "When was your last period?"

"Last week," she muttered.

He nodded. "Everything looks normal, Riza." The doctor moved to sit at a stool at the end of the exam table. "Just put your feet in the stirrups here."

She scooted down and placed her bare feet in the metal cradles, spreading her legs. She breathed in deeply as he inserted the cold metal speculum into her inner folds.

"So you work in the military?" The doctor asked calmly. Riza didn't mind the small talk to keep her mind off of the sting between her legs.

"Yes," She managed to squeak as the object in his hands pushed deep into her womb. "I'm General Mustang's personal adjutant."

"I see. Just a little pinch here, Riza." She gasped and grasped the sides of the gown. "Have you been working for him long?"

"Yes," she affirmed, sighing with relief as he slid the speculum out of her body. "I've been with him for many years."

The doctor moved to stand over her as she sat up. The gown slid off of her shoulders and she saw his glasses glint in the light.

"What's this on your back, Riza?" He asked, touching her bare shoulders. She realized that he was looking at the large, scarred tattoo on her back and her stomach churned.

"It's just an old war scar," She murmured, straightening the gown over her shoulders and wrapping it tightly around her body. He stared down at her for a moment before moving towards the door.

"Everything looks to be fine, Riza," he stated, looking back at her over his shoulder. She suddenly felt more naked than before and stood up, moving towards her clothes. "I'll follow up with you about your results in about a month."

"Thank you, Dr. Stala." Riza watched him leave and waited until the door closed.

She stared at the closed door while she quickly redressed. The queasiness in her stomach did not ease until she was at the front desk and taking her guns back from the receptionist. The young woman told her "Goodbye" cheerfully and Riza chided herself for being so paranoid.

But being paranoid was part of her job, she mused as she made her way to the bus station. There was someone very important that she had to protect.

* * *

 _AN: Sorry if this chapter seems boring or if the exam stuff is too squicky but it's important to set up later stuff. The action is coming, I promise! Please review and let me know what you think of how things are going so far!_


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